Amazon hit with fresh class action-style suit in UK — $3.4BN in competition damages sought for 200,000+ sellers

Amazon is facing another competition lawsuit in the UK. The latest claim, which was filed Thursday, is seeking more than £2.7BN in damages — or around $3.4BN at current exchange rates — before the UK’s Competition Appeals Tribunal. The case is being brought by Andreas Stephan, a professor of competition law at the University of … Read more

Odaseva raises $54M to secure Salesforce users

Cloud services continue to be a weak point for enterprises when it comes to security, so companies providing effective solutions to address this continue to see a lot of interest in the market, both from customers and investors.  In the latest example of that, Odaseva – which focuses on one sole use case: securing Salesforce … Read more

Dust grabs another $16 million for its enterprise AI assistants connected to internal data

French startup Dust has raised a $16 million Series A funding round led by Sequoia Capital. With Dust, companies can create custom AI assistants and share them with their employees so that they can work more efficiently. But what’s interesting with Dust is the differences with other companies working on enterprise agents or AI assistants … Read more

SpaceX scores $843M NASA contract to deorbit ISS in 2030

NASA has selected SpaceX to develop a spacecraft that will deorbit the International Space Station in 2030 — a contract valued at as much as $843 million, the agency announced Wednesday. The ISS is nearing the end of its operational life, and as plans for new, commercially-owned space stations heat up, the one that started … Read more

Sonia’s AI chatbot steps in for therapists

Can chatbots replace human therapists? Some startups — and patients — claim that they can. But it’s not exactly settled science. One study found that 80% of people who’ve used OpenAI’s ChatGPT for mental health advice consider it a good alternative to regular therapy, while a separate report found that chatbots can be effective in … Read more

Google improves search experience in the Chrome mobile app

Facing new competition from startups like Arc, Google announced on Wednesday that it’s bringing five new features to the Chrome browser on mobile devices, each designed to enhance the search experience. These include new shortcuts for local search results, a refreshed address bar for easier navigation, trending search suggestions, live sports cards for fans, and … Read more

Formation Bio raises $372M to boost drug development with AI

Formation Bio, a startup focused on applying AI to drug development with backing from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, has raised over a quarter-billion dollars to support its ambitious product roadmap. Formation announced Wednesday that it raised $372 million in a Series D funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz with participation from drug maker Sanofi, Sequoia, … Read more

This Week in AI: The fate of generative AI is in the courts’ hands

Hiya, folks, and welcome to TechCrunch’s regular AI newsletter. This week in AI, music labels accused two startups developing AI-powered song generators, Udio and Suno, of copyright infringement. The RIAA, the trade organization representing the music recording industry in the U.S., announced lawsuits against the companies on Monday, brought by Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music … Read more

Supreme Court rejects claim that Biden administration pressured social media firms into removing misinformation

The Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a Republican-led challenge to the Biden administration’s communication with social media companies to combat online misinformation on topics related to COVID-19 and the 2020 election. The ruling overturns an injunction, which was currently on hold, that would have limited contact between government officials and social media companies. The Republican … Read more